The arrest of the three men accused of gang raping a Korean teacher on the remote Korean island Heuksan-do has finally happened. Due to the public outrage it appears the Korean police are not going to give the perpetrators the benefit of using the “I was drunk excuse” so commonly used in these cases:
Three suspects have been charged with premeditated rape and assault in the investigation of a sexual assault case involving a female teacher in her 20s by three local men from Heuksan Island in Sinan County, South Jeolla.
The three suspects were scheduled to be sent to the prosecution today for further investigation. Each is a father of children in kindergarten, elementary or middle school. The children of two of the suspects are attending the school where the victim worked. They were arrested by police last Saturday, after the victim reported the crime.
One of the suspects, surnamed Park, 49, owns the restaurant where the teacher was having dinner prior to the crime on May 21. He and one other suspect, Lee, 34, are accused of having invited the teacher to join them and getting her drunk.
After the victim became intoxicated, Park brought her to a building at an elementary school at 11:00 p.m in his car while Lee followed. About 30 minutes later, police say, the other suspect, Kim, 38, drove to the elementary school building, as well.
The police initially planned to impose less severe charges on the three since they claimed the rape was not planned.
“The testimonies of the three suspects didn’t match,” said a police officer. “They seemed to have lied when they said the crime was not plotted.”
But given that the three suspects live in the same neighborhood, contacted each other before and after the crime and went inside the building and raped the victim in sequence, the police charged them with premeditated rape. [Joong Ang Ilbo]
You can read more at the link. Also for those wondering where Heuksan-do island is located at here is a Google Map of its location:
Incredibly the arrest of one of the suspects surnamed Kim has been linked to a 2007 rape in Daejon. The DNA found on the teacher matched the DNA found on the victim in the Daejon case. Due to the victim speaking out about this rape she may have gotten a serial rapist off the streets. It seems like if someone wanted to lie low and hide out somewhere Heuksando would be a place to go.
